Today's lesson is about poisonous plants,
dangerous delectables and fatal feedstuffs. I'm talking nightshade,
lupine, milkweed, and the poison used to kill Socrates: hemlock. Water
hemlock is said to look a lot like parsnips and a human can die in half
an hour just by licking the blade of the knife used to cut a hemlock
root. That's why I avoid all feedstuffs that look like vegetables!
Some
plants are poisonous only in huge doses. A 500 pound calf would have to
eat one and a half pounds of cocklebur seed to die. The preferred plant
for cows considering suicide is locoweed, but a bovine has to become
addicted to it and eat it for two to three weeks to go nuts, or develop
what cow coroners call "wet brain". (Also known as Congressperson
brain.)
An old cowboy once told me to
just remember that most poisonous plants are yellow and have three
leaves; "Three leaves stay clear, 5 leaves no fear." I've never had a
cow die from eating a poisonous plant but that doesn't mean there aren't
some really dangerous feedstuffs a cow can consume. Here's my list of
the worst:
Floral Arrangements:
Although I've never engaged in the practice, I understand there are some
men who buy their wives, girlfriends, or both, arrangements of flowers
at a place called a "florist". If you're a cattlemen you have a good
excuse for not buying such things. One time a neighbor threw an old
flower arrangement over her back fence and one of my cows ate it and got
really sick. Although we could never prove it, the vet and I believe it
was the delphiniums.
Alfalfa:
I'll never forget the time I saw two dozen bloated carcasses by the
side of the road and a rancher sitting on top of one of them bawling his
eyes out. He had drug them there to make it easier for the tallow man
to put them in his truck. The cows died from instant gasification, you
might say. I heard later that the rancher thought a change of pasture
was just what the cows needed but the next day there was another batch
of dead cows. Prussic acid has killed more cows than your vet and Mad
Cow put together.
Hay: Ranchers routinely throw their net worth out of the back end of the feed truck and every flake they throw is one dollar not saved for retirement, or spent on a romantic vacation with the wife. Putting up hay is a leading cause of exhaustion, accidents and divorce. This is why when they hear of an approaching fire most ranchers, instead of saving their herd, their family, or their barb wire collection, will scream, "Save the haystack."
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